Email this article to a friend

Three of the biggest Dutch pension funds, managing €227 billion between them, have said they want to talk to some large European construction companies, in which they have shareholdings, about the construction work for the Qatar 2022 World Cup.

Source: Getty Images

Construction of the venues for the event has been dogged by allegations of poor working conditions.

Pensioenfonds van den Metalektro and Pensioenfonds Metaal & Techniek are seeking discussions with construction groups Vinci and Hochtief over possible violations of labour rights on work sites in the Gulf state. Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn says it wants to speak to these two companies as well.

PFZW owns €115 million of stocks and bonds in French group Vinci, and €1.5 million of shares in Germany’s Hochtief. The value of PME and PMT’s holdings wasn’t disclosed. In statements issued over the weekend, PME and PMT said they were "monitoring the situation in Qatar and possible involvement in human rights abuses closely" and would seek "discussions" with Vinci and Hochtief on the topic. PFZW said it would “conduct a dialogue on the role [these companies] can take in raising and improving conditions in Qatar.”

Both firms are involved in the construction of Lusail City, a planned new city on the Qatari coast. The proposed Lusail Iconic Stadium will host the opening and closing matches of 2022's football World Cup.

Vinci, through its joint-venture with Qatari Diar, is involved in building transport infrastructure for Lusail City. A spokeswoman for Vinci said: "In Qatar, likewise the 100 other countries where our local subsidiaries operate, we are bound to respect local regulations. However, we always lead the way and rise standards in terms of human treatment, living conditions, health and security measures and training. Examples have been provided to [these] two Dutch pension funds."

A spokesman for Hochtief said the company was not currently operating any construction sites in Qatar. It had previously been involved in the Barwa Commercial Avenue project in the southern district of Doha, and it hoped to win further contracts in the future. It is also involved in the Lusail project, he confirmed, but only through a design consultancy arm at present.

He said: "Our major construction project in Qatar, Barwa Avenue, is now complete. We operated to very high standards in terms of health and safety, we had prayer rooms on site, cooling rooms, and millions of working-hours without accident. We have nothing to do with these accusations [of mistreatment of workers]."

The statements from the pension funds followed a report into the "violation of human and labour rights in the construction of the football stadium in Qatar" by the Dutch trade union confederation, FNV.

The FNV flagged up the connections of several Dutch financial institutions to construction projects in Qatar that have attracted criticism from workers' rights advocates.

According to the campaign organisation Human Rights Watch, the human rights climate in Qatar "remained problematic" in 2013, "particularly for the large and growing migrant worker population".

The organisation complained of "serious rights violations, including forced labour and arbitrary restrictions on the right to leave Qatar, which exposed [migrant workers] to exploitation and abuse by employers".

In response to previous allegations of poor working conditions from the International Trades Union Congress earlier this year, Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy, the body overseeing World Cup-related development, said in an emailed statement to the Wall Street Journal in March that the ITUC’s report contained “factual errors” and “attempts to discredit the positive work we are undertaking.” Qatar proposed reforms to its labour-market last month, including reform of the sponsorship system under which Qatari companies recruit foreign workers, and removing the need for a visa to exit the country.

PME and PMT said that if discussions with Vinci and Hochtief did not address their concerns over human and labour rights issues, the two companies might be added to the funds' formal "dialogue programmes" - a step that can eventually lead to the funds selling out of their holdings.

In the same joint statement, PME and PMT drew attention to their decision to sell out of US retailer Wal-Mart in 2013 over labour rights issues.

Peter Borgdorff, the executive director of Pensioenfonds Zorg en Welzijn, said in a statement at the fund's website: "We will go with probing questions to the companies operating in Qatar. The aim of these discussions is to achieve an improvement of the worksites. That means we do not step away from these companies. Having clean hands is nice, but the world is no better.

"Rather, we try to speak with the power of money and thus exercise positive influence. Only if that does not work after a serious attempt, do we step away. I hope that it does not come to that. Because that would mean that the loser of the World Cup in 2022 is already known – the construction worker in Qatar."